This study uses a natural experiment in the suburban public schools surrounding a Northeastern city to examine the processes through which continual immersion in divergent neighborhood contexts influences individuals and communities. The research has two overarching goals. First, the project seeks to understand how routine exposure to a majority-White, affluent suburban neighborhood context could influence the social and academic behaviors and aspirations of African-American adolescents from urban neighborhoods. Second, the research aims to identify the processes through which these students affect the social and cultural landscape of their school communities. Methodologically, the research relies on a comparison of three groups of eighth-to-tenth grade students in a metropolitan area. The first group attends majority-White schools in affluent suburban school district through a racial desegregation program (n=30). Members of the second group have been waitlisted for the desegregation program and attend low-performing, majority-minority public, charter, and parochial schools in the city (n=30). The third group consists of affluent White suburban students attending schools that participate in the desegregation program (n=30). Broadly, the research will provide theoretical and empirical insight into how social inequalities are reproduced and interrupted. The research will benefit policy makers by identifying the mechanisms through which exposure to an affluent suburban environment influences less privileged adolescents.
